The week saw another controversy involving the Chechen prime minister: on May 1, a delegation sent by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) was prevented from entering Tsentoroi, the native village of the Kadyrov clan. Kavkazky Uzel on May 2 quoted the... MORE

What those who have been kidnapped and incarcerated in Tsentoroi’s private jails have had to endure was described in horrifying detail by Sunday Times correspondent Mark Franchetti in an article published in the newspaper’s April 30 edition. Franchetti detailed the case of Akhmed Isaev, a... MORE

The New York Times reported on May 4 that Chechnya is undergoing a construction boom. In an article filed from Grozny, correspondent C. J. Chivers wrote that with the arrival of spring and “bombings and roadside ambushes less frequent than before,” sections of the republic... MORE

Russian news agencies reported on May 1 that Magomed Chakhkiev, the father-in-law of Ingushetian President Murat Zyazikov who was kidnapped on February 27, was freed. RIA Novosti quoted local law enforcement sources as saying the Chakhkiev, a deputy in Ingushetia’s parliament, had been freed as... MORE

--ACTIVISTS DEMAND PROBE INTO DAGESTANI PROTEST VIOLENCE The For Human Rights movement said on May 3 that it had written to Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov calling on him to investigate an April 25 incident in which police in Dagestan used force against protesters, killing at... MORE

Modern France has a long history of dealing with terrorists, whether the bomb-throwing anarchists of the late 19th century or the more sophisticated Corsicans, Basques and Islamists of the late 20th century. As the republic enters the 21st century, it finds itself grappling with an... MORE

The speaker of Chechnya’s parliament has called for the unification of Chechnya and Ingushetia—and, possibly, Dagestan. In an interview with Interfax on April 24, Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov called the liquidation of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Republic in June 1992 a historical mistake. “I am firmly convinced that... MORE

Gazeta reported on April 26 that a shoot-out took place in Grozny on April 25 between security forces loyal to Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov and members of Chechen President Alu Alkhanov’s unit of bodyguards. The battle reportedly occurred in the vicinity of the complex... MORE

Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov has accused inhabitants of temporary refugee camps of cooperating with the West against Russia, MosNews reported on April 25. Kadyrov had earlier been quoted as calling for all the temporary accommodation centers in Chechnya to be closed down as soon... MORE

The head of the Chechen separatists’ Chechen National Information Service, Movladi Udugov, has called for the “re-establishment” of Sharia law throughout the North Caucasus and said that this cannot take place until “Russian occupation forces” are driven out of the region. In an interview with... MORE